One of many fantastic restaurants in the new West Quay South is The Real Greek, tapas and meze food. I went down to this restaurant a while back when they opened, to try out all of the food and I came back a week ago to enjoy their brand NEW Vegan menu! A whole menu dedicated to plant based food. They also have a specialised wine and drinks list, so you can choose from vegan wine. But what makes a wine vegan? Well, in Greece they have an ingredient they use in the wine to preserve it and compliment the taste, but it's not vegan, whereas not all wines have this. Also the wax on an orange and lemon from the bees prevents it from being vegan, so all you vegans drinking orange juice, oops! There was also a wine called Ellinas White and thats basically 3 letters different from my name so of course I had that, and it was tasty!
I am not vegan but also not opposed to eating vegan food as it is extremely healthy and tastes just as good, sometimes better than regular food. We started off with the Greek Flatbread with Olive Oil & Dukkah, Green Pea Fava, and Houmous. The flatbread served as the perfect dippers for all of the dishes, and personally I think the Pea Fava was my favourite. The humous has such a great taste to it and not bland at all and the pea gave it a different element to swap between. The two dips with the bread were also extremely nice and me and my grandad had a go at mixing those with the humous and pea and it created some interesting flavours.
There is also a key on the menu to tell you if its V (veggie) VG (vegan) or GF (gluten free).
Then we move onto the mains.....
Starting from the top of the images, we had the Falafel, Moussaka, Spinach with Gigandes and Chickpea Triangles. As a fan of more crispy food, I went straight in for the triangles and it was delicious, the crunchy filo pastry with the warm inside was just divine and I could have easy eaten more of these. I had a go with the Moussaka (as I had tried it in the past as a microwave meal and hated it) but even though this one was cooked well and full of fresh ingredients, it still wasn't a dish for me. I don't much like the consistency but my grandad loves it and I could appreciate the flavours and quality. I then moved on to the gigantic beans with the spinach and I think this had to be my second favourite. The tomato and garlic sauce really made the beans so yummy.
The other dish was the Falafel, and not something I would normally go for, but we wanted a mix of veggie and carby (if you can it that?) with the textures so we went for them, and I'm glad we did. They weren't dry or boring and they still had flavour, and it was a good mix to use with the spinach gigantes (beans) dish too. I would definitely suggest getting a couple of different textured dishes to mix and match and not be too dry or too soggy.
By this point, we were so stuffed and had eaten so much but in the spirit of eating out, we of course had to have dessert. We decided a sorbet was small enough and quite refreshing that we wouldn't feel it was too much. We got the Lemon Sorbet and the Mango Sorbet and they were both so different but yummy. The mango was very tame and fruity and the lemon packed a tangy punch! Great for refreshing the palette after a big meal too.
All in all I was not disappointed by the new vegan menu and the waiters Kryziek and Alekos informed us that a lot of Greek food is naturally vegan due to the nature of the meze plates and the vegetables they have in them. So basically it's already super tasty and healthy! They haven't had to change to much for it to become what we call vegan and that's why the quality is still so good. Thankyou so much for the food and I think I'll be choosing Vegan options a lot more, especially if it's Greek food!
Find their website here: http://www.therealgreek.com/southampton/
Find their Instagram here: https://www.instagram.com/therealgreekuk/
The food was gifted for the purpose of this review but all tastings and opinions are my own :)
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